I have a
love of mystery. This has led me to study psychology at university to explore
the mystery of the psyche, and to study Sufism to explore the mystery of the nafs (egotistical self) and the qalb (spiritual heart).
Mystery
is something that is a central theme in the theology of Islam. The concept that
underlines this theme is “ilm al-ghayb” or knowledge of the unseen. Islamic
theology holds that there are things that only God knows. In addition to these,
there are things that God has chosen to show to select individuals, for
example, the Prophet Muhammad was shown the condition of the people of the
Hellfire. For the rest of us, however, we know only what we’ve been told in the
Holy Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad. Beyond that things are a
mystery.
That God
has chosen to leave things as a mystery is healthy as it facilitates an
attitude of humility in people. To acknowledge mystery is to admit that one
does not know everything. In Further
Along the Road Less Travelled, Dr Peck states that “. . . the reality of
the situation is that our knowledge is like a little raft bobbing up and down
in the sea of our ignorance, in an ocean of mystery” (p. 76). Thus, to be truly
knowledgeable we must engage with the ocean of mystery. We “must love to dive
in it and swim in it and splash and drink it and taste it” (ibid.). We need not
worry that the water will diminish, as “the more you drink in mystery, the
greater the supply becomes” (p. 78).
Diving in
and tasting the ocean of mystery describes what the mystics of the world’s
religions have attempted to do throughout the centuries. In the Muslim
community, some of these attempts have been recorded in what can be described
as books dealing with “experiential Sufism” like those of Rumi and Ibn
Arabi.
A word of
warning. If you want to dive in the ocean of mystery, you will need someone
holding a rope attached to you that will reel you in so that you don’t drown.
Such a person is a murshid or
spiritual guide.
May God
facilitate our connection with a spiritual guide. May we then have the
discipline and courage to dive into the ocean of mystery. Aameen.
